THIS is our time.
That was the message from two-time AFLW premiership coach Craig Starcevich in his address to the AFL Commission earlier this month.
Every year, the premiership coaches from the AFL and AFLW competitions are invited to present to the Commission, with the topic of their presentation entirely up to them.
Inspired by the recent nation-wide support of the Matildas in the FIFA Women’s World Cup, the longtime Lions mentor, urged the Commission to “promote the daylights” out of the AFLW competitions and its talented athletes.
"I was a little bit bloody nervous walking in there, because you've got the Commissioners there and the exec are there, so you've got everyone in there at once," Starcevich told AFL.com.au.
"If you want to hitch your wagon to the Matildas, they promote their players as athletes and what they might do on the pitch, and clubs they play for overseas, whatever it is, it's all around them as athletes and players and how good they are.
"We've got heaps of that in our competition right now. Let's latch onto that and promote the daylight out of that.
"That was one thing I said – what do you want to do now? We've got 540 athletes, we've got the best athletes in Australia – I think, but I'm biased – you've got this hot little product in your hand, how are you going to promote the daylights out of it and really crank it up. This is our time, right now, to really flow and go."
Although hailing from Western Australia, Starcevich has spent a few decades in the sunshine state, and has seen the development of women's sport in the region first-hand, developing talent for AFL Queensland before the commencement of the AFLW.
"My comparison for [the Commission] is when the (AFLW) comp started in 2017, from a Queensland perspective, the Queensland Firebirds were the number one women's ticket in town. Everyone was going to the netball. Laura Geitz was playing, Gretel Tippett, they've got guns everywhere, they're all playing for Australia and everyone knows who they are.
"I would say now, we're right up there in the conversation. Firebirds haven't been going too well recently, so we're probably the most prominent female sporting team in Queensland, right now.
"So how do we capitalise on that in our market – that's our problem as a football club – but in the greater conversation, how are we going to do that across all our states, and crank up AFLW to what could be or should be now, the number one female sport in Australia? That's where we should be aiming."
Starcevich also used the opportunity to talk about the wider impact of the Lions, an inaugural AFLW side who now have two flags under their belt from five Grand Final appearances.
Having lost waves of star players to expansion clubs over the years, he has long been a public critic over the AFL's strategies over the introduction of new teams, which has now reached its end point until the eventual introduction of Tasmania.
"You can take it wherever you want. The brief I was given was the Commission wants to hear your perspective on where you think the team is, where the competition is at, where you think you can find improvement, give us an insight as to your club's journey over the past year, how you got to the position you did," he said.
"There was a bit of chat about us losing players to expansion clubs, and regenerating. I got to let the know I wasn't happy with their strategy, which wasn't an entire surprise to them.
"Also, it was more around the legacy of the Brisbane Lions, we've got 30-plus players scattered around other clubs, Lauren Arnell (Port Adelaide), Daniel Webster (Hawthorn) and (former coach) David Lake at the inaugural Suns, so we've provided three coaches as well.
"That bit, when you sit back and just calm down for a minute, that's a nice legacy our team has had for the rest of the comp. We've done our bit, in other words.
"Selfishly, I threw in our Academy graduates – there's 26 kids who have come through our academy and played AFLW over the last five or six years of the academy being in existence."
